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Saturday Roundup: Winter Wonderland

Misc

Today, I am planning to be on the receiving end of a foot of snow coming in at 30 miles per hour. Tomorrow, when it’s time to clean all that crap out, it will be 30 degrees below zero. Fun!

The drawing for a $100 Amazon gift card is still going on!   Go here for details.  It ends on the 15th, so you have 4 more days.

Best Posts

Santa’s got a new phone number!   It plays a simple message when you call it, but it’s an easy way to make a little kids smile.

How many days of your life did that that new gadget cost you?

Go watch Crystal get all survivalist and stuff.  Have you ever though about what would happen if the world as you knew it ended?  Even for a few days, say, after a hurricane hit?

It’s great to live in the future.  I can’t wait to hit Lunar Starbucks.

LRN Timewarp

For those unfortunate enough to not have been tuned in since the beginning, I’m going to spend some time reviewing posts from a year ago.

In How to Have a Perfect Life, I layout the planning necessary to live a life you don’t regret on your deathbed.   Just take the first step.

Babies are Expensive is one of my most-visited posts to date, and was my first carnival submission, and my first editor’s pick for that submission.  The truth is, babies are expensive, but they don’t have to break the bank.

Don’t Screw Future-You was a fun post to write.  What would the you from 20 years in the future have to say to you?

Carnivals I’ve Rocked

Consumer Action Handbook was included in the Carnival of Personal Finance.

Mistakes Made was included in the Carnival of Money Stories.

Thank you! If I missed anyone, please let me know.

You’re Gonna Die, Part 1

Life

Death of a surrealist soldier
Image by funadium via Flickr

If you knew you were going to die tomorrow, what would you do today? How would you spend your last hours?  Would you go skydiving before the chance evaporated forever, or would you spend the day talking with your loved ones?

If you knew you would die in a month, what would you do?  Would you plan a trip to the one place in the world you’ve always wanted to see?  Would you look up all the friends you’ve been too busy to see?

What would you regret?  Is there something you have always wished you’d done, but have put off for some reason or another?  Do you want to write a novel, or backpack Europe, or watch a shuttle launch?   Far more people regret opportunities missed than those they’ve taken.  If there is something that you could do that would let you die happy, take steps today to make that a reality.  Remember that you are probably not going to die in a day or a month, but don’t let your entire life slip away without doing the things that matter most to you.

Our lives are short.  Far too short to waste time on the things that add no value.  Everything you do should advance your happiness, either short-term or long.  That doesn’t mean you should waste your life pursuing hedonism.  Lives need meaning.  Chase that meaning.

Find out what gives your life meaning.  What do you do that lets you go to bed with a smile on your face?  Those are the activities that you should maximize.  What is wasting your time?  You can probably shut off the news and never miss it.   It’s just too much information that doesn’t add anything to your life.   Does obsessing over Charlie Sheen’s latest antics ad any value to your life?   Take that time and write a screenplay, take a walk, smell a flower, hug your kids, anything that provides actual value for you.  Don’t waste your life on meaningless activities that do nothing more than kill time.  Time is the one thing we have that we will not get back.

Many people go to their deathbeds thinking, “I wish I had X.”  What is your X?  What would you wish you had done?

 

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Selling Your Car

Finance

English: Jalopy car in Joshua Tree National Pa...

English: Jalopy car in Joshua Tree National Park in Hidden Valley Campground (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

When it’s time to replace your car, most people focus on the new car, instead of the old, but that is ignoring real money.  Your old car–unless it has disintegrated–still has value.  Sometimes, it’s just time to ask yourself, “When should I sell my car?”

When you’re looking to sell your car (like with We Will Buy Your Car), you generally have several options:

  1. Tow & crush. If your car has been wrecked, doesn’t run, or is just old and beat up, you may be stuck with calling a junkyard and accepting $50 for them to pick up your car and crush it for scrap.
  2. Trade it in. This is probably the least hassle, but–other than #1–doesn’t pay well.  Dealerships are willing to pay something under what they will get at a wholesale auction, which is quite a bit less than the blue book value.
  3. Sell it yourself. Now you’re thinking, “He’s going to buy my car! Oh, bother.”  It can be a pain, but it’s also the best way to get a decent price for your wheels.

When you sell your car, there are a few things to keep in mind, much like when you sell something on Craigslist.

  • Don’t be alone. There are bad people in the world, but they don’t like witnesses.  Bad things are much less likely to happen if you have company.
  • Know your price. Specifically, know three price: your dream price, the price that would make you happy, and the absolute lowest price you are willing to accept.  Make sure you figure these numbers out ahead of time.  Know what you are comfortable with before it comes time to close the deal.
  • Check IDs. The buyer is going to want to test-drive your car.  That’s fine, but you want to make sure you know who is driving off in your car.  “Officer, Sumdood took my car.  He was wearing jeans.”  That won’t get your car back.
  • Clean it up. Get the car detailed before you show it to a potential buyer.   A sparkling-clean car will almost always bring in a few hundred extra dollars.  It’s well worth the expense.

Following this plan should make the sale go as smoothly as possible and bring you the most possible money.

Readers, what have you done to dispose of an old car?

This is a sponsored post written to provide some insight into the world of used car retail.

 

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The Unfrugal Meal

Finance, Parenting

A Teppanyaki chef cooking on a modern gas powe...
Image via Wikipedia

I spend a lot of time talking about how to save money here.  It’s kind of what I do.

Not today.

Today, I’m going to talk about the best way I’ve wasted money during my vacation this week.

First, so my feelings are completely understood:  A vacation is about experiences and memories.   I could spend all day at the park with my kids, or I could spend a memorable meal with them.   Which will they remember longer?

It ain’t the park.  They are there almost every day.

Of course, if the restaurant is McDonald’s they wouldn’t remember for long, either.

Tuesday, after a long day of hands-on, interactive museum-going, we took the kids to a Japanese steakhouse.   Teppanyaki, where they cook the food at the table, complete with fire, spatula spinning, and airborne food.

I’m the only one in my family who has seen that before.    Honestly, watching the art, the skill, the banter, and the giant fireball leaves me as wide-eyed as my kids.

They loved it.

Watching the chef throw a bowl full of rice across the table made my son’s jaw drop.

Seeing the chef carry fire from one side of the grill to the other on his fingers made my youngest squeal and beg for more fire tricks.

Getting squirted by the chef when he was putting out a flare-up made the middle brat giggle, possibly because the squirt gun was a little kid, dressed up as a fireman, with his pants down.   She got “peed” on and loved it.

Aside from cooking-as-a-show, the service was fantastic.   There was always a waiter nearby to keep our water glasses full or to provide “little kid” chopsticks, which are modified with rubber band to remove the need for skill to eat.   They had the courses perfectly timed.   The minute the salad was cleared, the soup was delivered.   When that was done, the chef rolled up to start on the rice.  My two-year-old was eating white rice without complaint for the first time.

Giggles and squeals.  Three days later, they are still talking about it.   My 11-year-old, who’s trying so hard to be an unimpressible teenager, says it was the coolest restaurant he’s ever seen.

Frugal, it wasn’t, but the memories were worth the money.

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Priorities

Business

I once saw a sign on the wall in a junkyard that said, “Failure to plan on your part does not constitute an emergency on my part.”

Another good one: “If everything is top priority, nothing is top priority.”

Once a week, I meet with my boss to discuss my progress for the previous week and my priorities for the coming week.   This is supposed to make sure that my productivity stays in line with the company’s goals.

Great.

Once a day, my boss comes into my office to change my top priority based on whichever account manager has most recently asked for a status update for their customer.

Not so great.

At least twice a week, he asks for a status update on my highest priority items.   Each time, he could mean the items we prioritized in the weekly meeting, or the items he chose to escalate later.   Somehow, getting a new task escalated doesn’t deescalate an existing task.

Everything is a top priority.

To compensate, I’ve been working a few 12 hour days each week, and occasionally coming in on the weekends.

I’m dedicated and still behind.

Prioritizing is treated as an art, or in the case I just mentioned, a juggling act.  It should be considered a science.  It’s usually pretty simple.

  • Is the problem costing you money? +1
  • Is the problem costing your customer money? +2
  • Is the problem going to hurt your reputation? +1
  • Is there a deadline? +1
  • Is it soon? +2
  • Is it urgent? +1
  • Is it important? +2
  • Are there absolutely no real consequences for anyone if it doesn’t get completed? -500

That’s it.    Too many times, we get hung up on urgent-but-not-important items and neglect the important things.

The hard part comes when it’s someone else setting your priorities, particularly when that person doesn’t rate things on urgency, importance, and cost but rather “Who has bitched the loudest recently?”

Can I tell my boss that I’m not going to do things the way he told me too?  No.  A former coworker very recently found out what happens when you do this.

Can I remind him that I’m busting my butt as hard as I can?  Yes, but it will just earn me a request to come in on the weekend, too.

Can I ignore the official priorities part of the time, and work on what I feel is most important to keeping our customers happy?  Yes, but it’s easy to go too far.  “Boss, I ignored what you said, but this customer is happy, now!” won’t score me any points if it happens every week.

Priorities are simple, but not always easy.  How do you balance your priorities?

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The Happy Challenge

Life

Watch this video.


Done?

Great.

For the cheaters, the part I am most interested in is the bit about reprogramming your brain for happiness.   Studies are showing that you can rewire yourself to be happier by doing happy things.

The science is sound.  Good things trigger a dopamine reaction.  Your body likes dopamine, so you start craving the things that make it happen, which all happen to be good things.  As you suffer dopamine withdrawal, you become driven to do what it takes to get your fix.

The process is similar to heroin withdrawal, with no downside.

Hugging your kids(assuming you like them) triggers the reaction.  So does sex, successes at work, and beating a video game.

The specific plan mentioned in the video is to write down three things that you are grateful for, once per day, for 21 days in a row.  That will begin the self-reinforcing training that can get you hooked on being happy.

That’s a win. 75% of job success is predicted by your attitude.  You are 31% more productive when you are happy.  You’re also more fun to be around.

That’s a win.

Here’s my challenge:

For the next 21 days, do it.  Write down 3 thing you are grateful for.  What makes you happy?  It’s okay if it’s hard.  If it’s hard for you, you need it more than most.

Now, the truly hard part:

Fill out this form every day.  Your answers can be as long or as short as you’d like, but there has to be 3 new things every day for 21 days.  We’re going to train your brain to look for the positive, so you can’t give me 63 things on day 21.  3 things, 21 days.

On day 22, tell me how the previous 3 weeks have been.

When it’s over, I’ll hold a drawing for everyone who completed the challenge.   Not everyone will see this immediately, so I’m going to run the challenge until May 15.    That means you have until April 24th to get started.

3 answers per day means three prizes.  I’ll give away a total of $250 to three lucky participants.   That’s a $125 prize, a $75 prize, and a $50 prize, but you have to obey the rules.  3 things, 21 days in a row.

Be happy.  I dare you.